Call of War 1.5: Mechanics & New Balancing

freezy wrote:

old SBDE per unit type is not coming back. First it is broken when having multiple unit levels of the same type on the field (as we have in 1.5) as each level counts as different unit in the code, secondly it is hard to visualize and understand (in comparison, a stack limit for the whole stack we can very well visualize on the map soon), and thirdly it still can be easily circumvented by splitting unit. Not a deep mechanic, just arbitrary complexity.

the old SBDE is contrived and convoluted, and never served the primary purpose of discouraging doom stacks, since 99% of the players don't know what SBDE is.

cycle9 wrote:

freezy wrote:

old SBDE per unit type is not coming back. First it is broken when having multiple unit levels of the same type on the field (as we have in 1.5) as each level counts as different unit in the code, secondly it is hard to visualize and understand (in comparison, a stack limit for the whole stack we can very well visualize on the map soon), and thirdly it still can be easily circumvented by splitting unit. Not a deep mechanic, just arbitrary complexity.

glad to read that.the old SBDE is contrived and convoluted, and never served the primary purpose of discouraging doom stacks, since 99% of the players don't know what SBDE is.

It should have been a bit fat value that you get directly in the bottom panel when clickling on the unit "This group fights at 76% percent efficiency" with an explanation when you hover your mouse (or click) on the sentence.

This unit is efficient because :

- You have 12 infantry units when the efficient value is 8. Impact : -13%

- You have 6 light tanks when the efficient value is 5. Impact : - 7%

etc...

freezy wrote:

We want to make province management easier. We don't want players to manage hundreds of provinces anymore with dozens of simultaneous productions going on, scrolling through an endless province list once they conquered 2-3 nations. We also want to diversify the gameplay by giving having different province types with different functions, and we want to create meaningful points of interest on the map where battles evolve around.We will rebalance all unit values for the second event and also change some unit roles again. The end result should be more realistic than the first draft.

I don't know of any US, UK manufacturing facilities that were operating in Europe by the time Berlin fell. Nor would anyone trust shells and weapons manufactured, or units trained in conquered countries actually proving worthy on the battlefield (often against their own countrymen), and not blowing up in the conquerors face.

I realize that this game mechanic is necessary to provide objectives worth capturing on the map, yet doing so we're accepting this "gamified" adaptation of Unit Production in enemy territory AND collecting resources from conquered provinces even though neither has any historical merit.

That balance between objective/production are well represented in game and drive actions, I'm not sure if limiting those objectives to fewer targets helps.

Will have to try see how the Balancing efforts turn out when next CoW 1.5 Event launches in the new year.

OneNutSquirrel wrote:

freezy wrote:

We want to make province management easier. We don't want players to manage hundreds of provinces anymore with dozens of simultaneous productions going on, scrolling through an endless province list once they conquered 2-3 nations. We also want to diversify the gameplay by giving having different province types with different functions, and we want to create meaningful points of interest on the map where battles evolve around.We will rebalance all unit values for the second event and also change some unit roles again. The end result should be more realistic than the first draft.

So is "aesthetics" taking precedence over historical accuracy then? I'm just trying to remember an instance of where during WWII, either the Axis or Allies conquered a province, then used those "resources" for their own needs. Perhaps Oil and Germany's capture of Finland for their Iron mines being the only two exception (that come to my mind anyway.

I don't know of any US, UK manufacturing facilities that were operating in Europe by the time Berlin fell. Nor would anyone trust shells and weapons manufactured, or units trained in conquered countries actually proving worthy on the battlefield (often against their own countrymen), and not blowing up in the conquerors face.

I realize that this game mechanic is necessary to provide objectives worth capturing on the map, yet doing so we're accepting this "gamified" adaptation of Unit Production in enemy territory AND collecting resources from conquered provinces even though neither has any historical merit.

That balance between objective/production are well represented in game and drive actions, I'm not sure if limiting those objectives to fewer targets helps.

Will have to try see how the Balancing efforts turn out when next CoW 1.5 Event launches in the new year.

For industry it was rarer but Germany used the Czech industries for instance, but also Western Europe industries (famously Renault in French) to build vehicles (though not tanks). It used surviving IC rather than new IC though.

OneNutSquirrel wrote:

I realize that this game mechanic is necessary to provide objectives worth capturing on the map, yet doing so we're accepting this "gamified" adaptation of Unit Production in enemy territory AND collecting resources from conquered provinces even though neither has any historical merit.

That balance between objective/production are well represented in game and drive actions, I'm not sure if limiting those objectives to fewer targets helps.

freezy wrote:

We want to make province management easier. We don't want players to manage hundreds of provinces anymore with dozens of simultaneous productions going on, scrolling through an endless province list once they conquered 2-3 nations. We also want to diversify the gameplay by giving having different province types with different functions, and we want to create meaningful points of interest on the map where battles evolve around.

For realistic, resource should gather on the terrain except urban area. And plain should have ability to build barrack, airport, but maybe not industry. Forest and mountain can only build few buildings(maybe can build something like farm or tobacco field, tea garden?) too.

As for unit values, I don't have any comment. Just wait and see.

@freezy, thanks for the replies to two of my thoughts. Makes me hope that we can now finally start to debate the core principles introduced by CoW1.5.

freezy wrote:

old SBDE per unit type is not coming back. First it is broken when having multiple unit levels of the same type on the field (as we have in 1.5) as each level counts as different unit in the code

* If you make it strict (i.e. allow only very few units of same type in one stack to have 100% SBDE), it would force players to research and build a big variety of units. Which would be more fun, strategically diverse and also more realistic. SBDE as in 1.5 is not realistic, since it incentives composing stacks containing only one, two or three types of units and punishes very big stacks, while in reality armies were more successful and could minimize own losses better the more diverse and the bigger they got - in WW2 it was always beneficial to have a superior number of troops and to have all kinds of weaponry in place so you could always use the one that's best suitable for whatever job needed to be done.

* You wouldn't need to squeeze units into unrealistic roles, because strict SBDE-per-unit-type limits would be enough to make players choose many different types of units.

* Combined with the thought from my last post to introduce a "Tactics" research tree offering players to research increased SBDE limits, it would make stack sizes grow over time, which would allow the existence of many units in late game while still being manageable. Also - as @vonlettowvorbeck already said, such a research tree would already be sufficient to explain SBDE to everyone.

So if it is implementable with less than 1000 hours of development effort, you should take that effort. It's definitely worth several hundreds of developer hours.

freezy wrote:

secondly it is hard to visualize

In this example, the player hasn't researched anything in the "Tactics" research tree, so his SBDE limit is 2 for both infantry and armour. Then a "3" in the unit bar is displayed in yellow, a "4" in a darker yellow, a "5" in a light orange, a "6" in a dark orange and a "7" or higher number in red. And a tooltip explains when hovering the mouse above.

OK, on mobile displaying things in an easily understandable way is more difficult. But there again we're at a point where I say that realism and strategic depth of CoW shouldn't be sacrificed for the sake of playability on smartphones. Better use another game (like Supremacy1) for mobile or create a new one.

freezy wrote:

and to understand

freezy wrote:

and thirdly it still can be easily circumvented by splitting unit

A) Splitting your stack as defender is not possible. Have you ever tried to defend with two stacks against an opposing stack attacking your province? That's like playing one-two alone ("Doppelpass alleine").

B) Splitting your stack as attacker with non-ranged ground units often isn't possible either, because in many situations your second stack would be added to the first if you send the second to the location of a running battle. In the situations where it is possible, you wouldn't want to do it, because two of your stacks deal the same attack damage but receive twice the defense fire as one big stack.

C) Splitting air units into small stacks is possible, but you don't want to do that as far as SBDE limit allows - same reason as above.

D) Splitting ranged units into small stacks is possible and beneficial (unless having a duel at range with an enemy having ranged units as well), yeah, but that's the same in the CoW1.5 SBDE system.

E) Even if this "argument" was logically correct, it would account the same way for the CoW1.5 SBDE system.

So all in all thanks again for your answer, but it nutrifies my apprehension that my proposal(s) haven't been read carefully and that the change of the SBDE system hasn't been thought through... and is bad.

We can certainly discuss these principles, if you would also accept short answers or a simple "no" on some topics Some things we just really want to do (or not do).

Hans A. Pils wrote:

@freezy, thanks for the replies to two of my thoughts. Makes me hope that we can now finally start to debate the core principles introduced by CoW1.5.

I'm aware of that. That's why I suggested a dozen times to change that in the code. In other words to make the old SBDE per unit type count for all units of the respective type in the stack, regardless of their level. Of course if you say this coding cannot be changed that way, due to whatever technical reasons, then that's a totally different story. But if it is implementable, I want to keep up my proposal. Cause it would be many times better. Advantages compared to SBDE as in CoW1.5 If you make it strict (i.e. allow only very few units of same type in one stack to have 100% SBDE), it would force players to research and build a big variety of units. Which would be more fun, strategically diverse and also more realistic. SBDE as in 1.5 is not realistic, since it incentives composing stacks containing only one, two or three types of units and punishes very big stacks, while in reality armies were more successful and could minimize own losses better the more diverse and the bigger they got - in WW2 it was always beneficial to have a superior number of troops and to have all kinds of weaponry in place so you could always use the one that's best suitable for whatever job needed to be done.

* You wouldn't need to squeeze units into unrealistic roles, because strict SBDE-per-unit-type limits would be enough to make players choose many different types of units.

* Combined with the thought from my last post to introduce a "Tactics" research tree offering players to research increased SBDE limits, it would make stack sizes grow over time, which would allow the existence of many units in late game while still being manageable. Also - as @vonlettowvorbeck already said, such a research tree would already be sufficient to explain SBDE to everyone.

So if it is implementable with less than 1000 hours of development effort, you should take that effort. It's definitely worth several hundreds of developer hours.

Our combat system is also rather messy in general, probably one topic we may also focus on next year. I am sure we can make combat deeper and more strategic without making it complicated.

Hans A. Pils wrote:

Admittedly, it is a bit harder to visualize. But possible. At least for desktop version, where you can work with tooltips, there are many options. How about this, for instance:

In this example, the player hasn't researched anything in the "Tactics" research tree, so his SBDE limit is 2 for both infantry and armour. Then a "3" in the unit bar is displayed in yellow, a "4" in a darker yellow, a "5" in a light orange, a "6" in a dark orange and a "7" or higher number in red. And a tooltip explains when hovering the mouse above.

OK, on mobile displaying things in an easily understandable way is more difficult. But there again we're at a point where I say that realism and strategic depth of CoW shouldn't be sacrificed for the sake of playability on smartphones. Better use another game (like Supremacy1) for mobile or create a new one.

Yes your proposal could be made understandable (I would understand it), still its more complicated as you say yourself.

Hans A. Pils wrote:

Nah, no, it's not difficult to understand. Only it so far hardly is displayed anywhere (in mobile version not at all), which is why many people think it's complicated. There were several proposals how and where it might be displayed in this thread or for example in --> this post <--.Now you must be joking.

A) Splitting your stack as defender is not possible. Have you ever tried to defend with two stacks against an opposing stack attacking your province? That's like playing one-two alone ("Doppelpass alleine").

B) Splitting your stack as attacker with non-ranged ground units often isn't possible either, because in many situations your second stack would be added to the first if you send the second to the location of a running battle. In the situations where it is possible, you wouldn't want to do it, because two of your stacks deal the same attack damage but receive twice the defense fire as one big stack.

C) Splitting air units into small stacks is possible, but you don't want to do that as far as SBDE limit allows - same reason as above.

D) Splitting ranged units into small stacks is possible and beneficial (unless having a duel at range with an enemy having ranged units as well), yeah, but that's the same in the CoW1.5 SBDE system.

E) Even if this "argument" was logically correct, it would account the same way for the CoW1.5 SBDE system.

So all in all thanks again for your answer, but it nutrifies my apprehension that my proposal(s) haven't been read carefully and that the change of the SBDE system hasn't been thought through... and is bad.

Its also possible to prevent your armies from merging even when fighting in the same spot, just by giving both armies a different order of what to do next.

But yeah this part was only a minor point in my argument, as you are right that also with the limit for the whole stack the same splitting tactics are still possible. Those splitting shenanigangs will become less important though as a stack limit is harder to reach than a low limit on a per unit basis, and that's a good thing in our eyes.

SBDE is not necessary as it goes without saying that "combined warfare" has always been the Key in Strategic Warfare.

Basically having the right weapons to engage Offensively or Defensively depending on what the enemy is bringing to the Engagement.

But if this is reaching the right "Eyes" the "Designer" then their is a far more important thing to discuss here and now.

The newest releases such as "Historical" or "All In" maps have a fatal flaw. You have reduced the resources by from 50% to 60% which means it is impossible to build a Military to even attempt to Win. You have even reduced Manpower production by as much as 50%.

These resource problems on Newest Maps needs swift reparations

Hey, this is probably a bug. We will look into it and if it's a bug fix it with the next update. Until then you sadly have to live with the balance on these maps, sorry for that.

Normally I would say please report this as a bug via the bug report form, but we are aware of the issue now.

Huh, now this time I can recognize your answer is well-thought-out, so this time thanks without a "but" .

freezy wrote:

Unit diversity we can achieve via general balancing.

freezy wrote:

We rather want to see multiple stacks of single unit types than a large stack of alot of unit types.

freezy wrote:

Players know better how to counter multiple single-type stacks than how to counter a large convoluted stack.

It's for sure more realistic, as in the real WW2 batallions of all types were pretty much mixing up. And I personally prefer that type of strategic and tactical thinking and consider it more challenging. But probably the latter is a matter of taste - some people might prefer a rock/paper/scissors type of play with a clear "right" and "wrong".

freezy wrote:

Cross-platform play is one of our key strategies. All of our designs have to be possible on both desktop and mobile.

freezy wrote:

You are probably aware of the "bug" or "feature" that gives multiple defending armies in the same spot an advantage

freezy wrote:

Its also possible to prevent your armies from merging even when fighting in the same spot, just by giving both armies a different order of what to do next.

freezy wrote:

We want to make province management easier. We don't want players to manage hundreds of provinces anymore with dozens of simultaneous productions going on, scrolling through an endless province list once they conquered 2-3 nations.

Also scrolling through the province list never felt like being annoying to me. Besides that, it's reduced to a minimum already with the introduction of the new specialized production buildings. If you sort the province list by these, you directly have at hand the few provinces in which the unit you want to build can be produced. Isn't that enough to facilitate unit production management?

I think giving production orders is fun. If you can do that only seldomly even in late game, that's not an improvement.

freezy wrote:

we want to create meaningful points of interest on the map where battles evolve around

But I would rather say "I want battles to evolve along a front line, because that's realistic and makes you think hard how to optimally distribute your units tactically along the front line".

Or "I want resource income and production capacities to be distributed rather well over the player's territory, because that's more realistic and makes an ugly rush / surprise tactic aiming at taking one city during the night without actually being superior by exploiting the opponents sleeping time less feasible".

Sorry, I'm not convinced at all after reading your replies concerning resource and production centralization. It's badly unrealistic and unsatisfying to have to focus on very few provinces, while the rural provinces are just desert in between.

Single Unit Type Stacks ?

This seems to be completely without precedent in military tactics. It was the cross Class support of unit types that made combat armies most effective.

Advancing Infantry could make faster progress when the enemy had their heads down because of an Artillery Barrage taking place at the same time. D-Day landings occurred while dozens of ships got much lighter lobbing thousands of tons of explosives overhead. That naval support came immediately AFTER the Air transport of thousands of paratroopers had been dropped in the early morning hours just moments earlier.

A few advancing tanks, as tough as they were, could easily be taken out by infantry if the tanks just attempted to punch through the infantry lines with no regard to infantry carrying explosives and anti tank hand weapons flanking them. While the same few tanks were greatly more efficient with infantry support and acted as moving steel walls for the infantry advance so they couldn't get flanked, and the infantry had protection for the advance.... Add a little overhead support from Air or Artillery and you had an offensive force to be reckoned with.

Single "Class" (I use the CoW term distinguishing between unit types) forces often had blaring deficiencies which could be exploited by the defender to his advantage.

Something to consider in replacing SBDE and incorporating these Stack Limits CoW 1.5 is to see.

This Idea comes from Battlefleet Gothic, fleet making doctrine. In order to add more complex ships to your Fleet, you had to have certain "smaller" ships quantities. For example, to add a cruiser, you had to have 3 Squads of Corvettes, to add a Battlecruiser, you had to have 2 cruisers (and 6 Corvette Squads)... and so on.

Applying a similar "unit Classes never operate alone" MO, Units should perform better when supported by other, complimentary classes of units. For example, An infantry unit gets 50% bonus to OFFENSIVE stats if accompanied by LTs (offensive), and a 50% bonus to DEFENSIVE stats if accompanied by Anti-Tank or Tank Destroyers.

Units get a 50% penalty to DEFENSE vs Infantry and Armour if taking ARTILLERY fire (this would mean that Units getting hit by Artillery get a penalty to getting hit by Artillery.. (I see it), so adjusting Arty Damage DOWN to reflect that would be appropriate).

By adding BONUS/PENALTY to units when their actions have Complimentary Support, is one way that could realistically add a strategic element to unit actions and compositions on the field.

I'm not suggesting Stacks are prevented from being formed unless you have X of this or that in them, just that doing so, can have Positive/Negative effects on their abilities.

Hans A. Pils wrote:

freezy wrote:

We want to make province management easier. We don't want players to manage hundreds of provinces anymore with dozens of simultaneous productions going on, scrolling through an endless province list once they conquered 2-3 nations.

Are you sure that players also don't want to have dozens of simultaneous productions going on? I'm convinced that almost all players want to have many units in late game. Everything else would be weird and not satisfying. Epic battles in late game are the cherry on the cake. And a big nation has a tall army. Full stop.Also scrolling through the province list never felt like being annoying to me. Besides that, it's reduced to a minimum already with the introduction of the new specialized production buildings. If you sort the province list by these, you directly have at hand the few provinces in which the unit you want to build can be produced. Isn't that enough to facilitate unit production management?

I think giving production orders is fun. If you can do that only seldomly even in late game, that's not an improvement.

Hans A. Pils wrote:

freezy wrote:

we want to create meaningful points of interest on the map where battles evolve around

At first glance, that's not an unreasonable thought.But I would rather say "I want battles to evolve along a front line, because that's realistic and makes you think hard how to optimally distribute your units tactically along the front line".

Or "I want resource income and production capacities to be distributed rather well over the player's territory, because that's more realistic and makes an ugly rush / surprise tactic aiming at taking one city during the night without actually being superior by exploiting the opponents sleeping time less feasible".

Sorry, I'm not convinced at all after reading your replies concerning resource and production centralization. It's badly unrealistic and unsatisfying to have to focus on very few provinces, while the rural provinces are just desert in between.

Hans A. Pils wrote:

freezy wrote:

Cross-platform play is one of our key strategies. All of our designs have to be possible on both desktop and mobile.

OK. Since that sounds like a very consciously made decision, I'll try to accept this from now on.

As for your other posts: Good that we could agree on som things more or less

Chimere wrote:

I prefered the old SBDE. 99% did not understand what SBDE was because it was poorly conveyed in the "info" of individual units.

And this is where Bytro makes its biggest mistakes all along.

This is why players do no stay around and play on.

Nobody - thus especially not 'noobs' (= nobodies) or 'newbies' (= being new in the game) - likes to play a game which appears to have weird magical outcomes of battles.

These weird magical outcomes are, however, not weird and magical to those that got the INFO.

Honestly, it has taken me several years before I got to understanding what the scarce info given was meant for.

E.g. only from looking at what happened, I discovered SBDE long before I ever knew there was something like SBDE.

And that is the same with many other things.

To make COW 1.0 :

• more attractive, understandable and playable for newbies and noobs

• thus more FUN,

• which will result in better player retention and more paying customers,

COW needs a good set of progressively difficult tutorials and good info in-game!

(Like every other game out there that is moderately successful)

You need to teach new players the ropes and if you don't, you will lose them.

You do not need to take the complexity out of the game, but you do need to provide the INFO and teach to use it.

Simplifying the game only makes it less attractive to play for those who 'get it', but even a simplified game without a good set of tutorials will fail, as it 'simply' will remain to complicated and thus too unattractive to hang around for 99% of newbies.

Hans A. Pils wrote:

A strategy game (like CoW is... or let me render this more precisely: like CoW1.0 is) should be easy to play and understand - that much is true.

But at the same time, becoming a good player shouldn't be easy at all. You should have to use your gray matter very much in order to make the right decisions. Because that's the appeal of a strategy game, that it makes you think.

And COW 1.5 suffers from this flaw as much - if not more - than COW 1.0.

To newbies, COW 1.5 offers more and more fatal ways to go completely wrong in the early phases of the game, which IMO is a good recipe for losing new players faster than ever.

the all your change look how like mechanics at Supremacy1: The great War and its tottaly bad,

Faster game... killed this game. This is not a game where I sit with friends for a session. Here the time passes 24h / 7 and in this case you can lose as you sleep sweetly. Thanks, but I think this change is not for most players. And so I have enough sleepless nights behind this game.

Stack Damage. It's the same as in S1: GW. Penalty for more than 20 units in the stack. Nice, but first improve the visibility of the map, because when there are more than 3 stacks on the battlefield, there is nothing visible. And stacks won't solve the army stacking problem.

Penalty for distance to the capital? It still sounds like a punishment for conquest

Maintaining units costs every resources. Wow, will you change the distribution of raw materials so that there is any balance? Now, even after changing Goods for food in the cost of research, some countries are unplayable.

No unit promotion? It's nice that afterwards you have lots of stacks of low level units that you can send to death.

I don't have to be on the tests to know what it will look like at 90%. Each of these changes is implemented in S1: GW. And this is totally wrong, such a change in gamplay ... with maps shine empty in this game.

Edit:

I've been playing your games for almost 10 years with breaks.

freezy wrote:

The rural provinces are not just desert. You can still build supporting or economic structures in them, and doing so was quite beneficial already in the 1st event. From what I remember you did not play the 1st event yourself and just make arguments based on theory, but I invite you to try it out for yourself in the 2nd event to see how it feels

What's the balance idea of yours? I really want to hear about that. Maybe this is the only way to make us accepted.

How about a compromise, the factory specific buildings function to shorten the time it takes to make the specific type, but allow a generic factory to build anything at a slower rate.

Also you should spread out resources to other non urban provinces so it makes sence to have food in the plains, rares in mountains, and oil and steel in hills.

EZ Dolittle wrote:

How about a compromise, the factory specific buildings function to shorten the time it takes to make the specific type, but allow a generic factory to build anything at a slower rate.